I'm out biking this week, so enjoy a few links. I'll be back on Friday or Saturday....
- UPDATE: Latest TISR poll has Hung in low 20s, performs worse than Soong in 3-way match. Her overall score is actually declining as public becomes more aware of her extremism. Sure hope the KMT sticks with her.
- UPDATE: Miaoli county, KMT stronghold, is a financial ruin thanks to years of KMT mismanagement. The KMT news organ scribes on the gov't bailout for it. As bureaucrats and others dependent on the government's largesse feel the pinch, lots of voters may consider switching parties in that lovely but woefully run county.
- Alas, this abandoned development in Keelung no longer exists, but Taiwan is studded with similar places. Taichung is the realm of ruins, behind my house are a couple of developments like this one.
- FocusTaiwan article on Ma Administration propaganda about the 1992 Consensus. I suspect that our 'diplomatic allies' are being quietly told to switch sides when Tsai comes to power.
- Jerome Cohen thinks Ma Ying-jeou should get a Nobel for his East China Sea (Senkakus) Peace Initiative. Note that the implication is that China and Japan are going to war (no shit, sherlock). One hardly knows whether to laugh or cry when the news becomes a parody of itself like this. UPDATE: Apparently Cohen never said that Ma deserves a Nobel.
- Seed Museum called for by forestry expert
- A Commonwealth piece on a Taiwan expert with a deep love for Taiwan, someone I very much admire.
- On the roof of Taichung's first plaza
- Poll on presidential race: Tsai wins crushingly in 3-way race
- Hung vs. KMT: the KMT news organ with a UDN editorial
- A fifth death in the water park disaster, another 213 remain in critical condition. We will surely lose more. This Commonwealth piece discusses the stress on the health and health insurance system.
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20 comments:
I suspect that our 'diplomatic allies' are being quietly told to switch sides when Tsai comes to power.
He is a master of confuser and liar. He well deserves Jerome Cohen's praise.
By the way, what would Jerome Cohen think of the latest mass arrest of human right lawyers in People's Republic of China? Perhaps one more good piece of Nobel peace material, Chairman Xi that is.
New York University law professor Jerome Cohen, one of the first American lawyers to work in China after the country opened up in the late 1970s, described the sweep as “insane.” China’s leaders “must be in desperate straits to engage in this extraordinary, coordinated attack on human-rights lawyers,” he said.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/china-targets-human-rights-lawyers-in-crackdown-1436715268
i just dont understand why taiwanese people - who are a very educated and well-traveled people - dont maintain their environment, their architecture/buildings and overall their country. why do most of taiwan look like a third world country? even manila is a better designed and developed city in terms of urban planning look much more cosmopolitan than taipei. everything in taiwan is done "on the cheap" - functionality and practicality supersedes aesthetics and design. and to think taipei is hosting a world design conference. it's like throwing a fancy party at your run-down home. :/
Taiwan's ugly land development is directly related to the ease and frequency of land expropriation. If you don't know if you'll be able to keep your property, you won't invest in it. As for abandoned projects like this Keelung thing, since personal and political connections matter more for project tenders than the actual content of the project, land is not developed in the best or even a viable way.
I actually like the jumbled up mazes of narrow alleys and decaying houses that typify Taiwan's inner cities. Adjacent to my house are several old, abandoned houses that have been taken over by feral cats. I quite like this, even if nobody else does. And anyway, given that aesthetics are subjective, the prioritization of functionality and practicality is exactly what builders should be doing (and not that they necessarily were doing that either mind you).
"on the cheap"
do you think two million chinese refuges in 1949 might play a role? and before they arrived, taiwanese artists, poets, judges, doctors were killed to make a way.
on the other hand, taiwanese people are not so well-educated. we go to school to learn chinese civilization as the best and only. the rest of the world is savage.
by the way, why every kafkaesque movie always pictures authoritarian cityscape tidy and clean like in THX1138? it should be more like taipei.
The Nobel is a bit of a reach, but he's a shoo-in for the Confucius Prize or the Tang Prize.
"i just dont understand why taiwanese people - who are a very educated and well-traveled people - dont maintain their environment, their architecture/buildings and overall their country."
There is nothing wrong, or out of the ordinary, with ruins. The only places where one does not see any are in places with strong housing/property/construction markets or where there are no people. In fact, much of our interest in heritage preservation derives from the 19th century romantic movement. Prior to that, ruins were commonplace in Europe yet were rarely respected or preserved, even in cases when they were significant. Check out the history of Split in Croatia for example.
The reality is that it costs money to knock down buildings, so if nothing of higher value can be found to put in the place of the ruins, they usually remain. So give Taiwanese a break on this one. They are no different from people anywhere else on this one.
"...why every kafkaesque movie always pictures authoritarian cityscape tidy and clean..."
Why indeed! Obviously the full horror of it hasn't yet occurred to you.
"i just dont understand why taiwanese people - who are a very educated and well-traveled people - dont maintain their environment, their architecture/buildings and overall their country."
When I first arrived in Taiwan, I had similar feelings as you. But now I don't feel that way at all, and I believe my initial reaction was really a reflection of my cultural bias. I'm sure there are many reasons why Taiwanese buildings/cities look the way they do (probably many more reasons than I will ever understand). However, one thing I've come to learn is that Taiwanese people often do not like the exterior of their homes to look flashy because of a fear of attracting thieves. You may see a home in Taiwan, and assume that the family that lives there is poor. But, that may very well be a false assumption. Because the interior may be lavish. So, seeing the inside of one's home often reveals that the family indeed has means. But even a sparsely decorated home can be deceiving, because many Taiwanese prefer to save their money rather than spend a lot on unpractical things.
Also, Taiwan is one of the most densely populated places on earth, and I'm sure that plays a role as well.
Today, when I stroll the streets of Taiwan I see beauty everywhere, when previously I saw a mess. But the streets didn't change, I did. I love the crowded and chaotic cities and the illogically meandering roads.
Why are not you guys seeing the sun rising over Taiwan?
Why are not you guys focusing on what is going on under your noses on the real Formosa?
Why are not you guys marveling at how Formosans are taking great pride into and care of their heritage?
Please follow the group: 台灣日式宿舍群 近來可好
https://www.facebook.com/groups/176223359193164/
The object in your photo used to be a forklift or bulldozer.
@Mike Fagan
Yes, aesthetics are subjective. This is why the argument rages on whether Tampa or Chicago has the greater architectural legacy. There's just no basis on which to make such a judgment.
Yes. I'm from County Durham, and it seems rather odd to me to acclaim a dreary office building in Chicago as the "world's first skyscraper".
If you think Chicago's architectural legacy is limited to a neither-here-nor-there claim to the first skyscraper, then all I can say is enjoy your narrow alleys and feral cats.
I will of course, but you misunderstood my comment - which was not about the limits of Chicago's architectural legacy but about the limits of the concept of "legacy".
You're right. It makes much more sense to talk about great architecture, amenities and quality of life as it exists now than trying to look back.
i think taiwan's alley system is chaotic and ugly. i dont know why people like that. i wouldnt want to live there. not saying i want to live on a broad avenue full of traffic either. but i would want to live on a regular street with sidewalks so it's safe to walk on. thats basic city urban planning 101 for developed even developing countries.
"...but i would want to live on a regular street with sidewalks so it's safe to walk on. thats basic city urban planning 101 for developed even developing countries."
Zhubei city (across the river from Hsinchu city) is like that; pavements alongside the roads to make it easy to walk around. But government implementing that kind of thing in a place like Tainan city is problematic because it would necessitate buying (or most likely expropriating) vast swathes of private property.
Personally, I would like to see a vast network of elevated tubes across the city through which people would move using roller-blades and bicycles. It would be unique of course since nobody has ever done this before, and it would also allow for better pollution-free transport on a voluntary basis which would have the added advantage of allowing people to exercise on their way to work in what is probably a much safer environment than a road filled with trucks, cars and scooters. But it is an innovation. And there has been essentially no innovation in urban transport infrastructure since the introduction of the freeway. All we have are roads and railways - for even the MRT is basically just a train on an elevated railway. That lack of innovation is a consequence of the political power acquired by urban planning, and its' boa constrictor like grip on the growth of cities.
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